This gospel of salvation is not a popular message. Many pastors, teachers, and others out sharing the gospel have diluted the purity of its truth in order to spare the emotions of sinners. In this passage, Jesus calls out the wretched spiritual state of man by calling those who were in the synagogue spiritually poor, blind, prisoners, and oppressed. In the company of those who do all of the external things pertaining to tradition and rituals in the synagogue, this was not the message they were willing to accept. As a result of their suppression, they sought to throw God, the Promised Messiah, Savior of the world, over a cliff. This is how blind they were of their spiritual deficiency. In Capernaum, which was just north a few cities of Nazareth along the northern border of the Sea of Galilee, Jesus did some things there which were recorded in John’s gospel. In John 4:46-54, Jesus performs the second miracle of His Galilean ministry in Capernaum from Cana. A royal official came requesting that Jesus heal his sick son whom was in Capernaum. Jesus told him to return home to his son and that he would be healed. The official believed and went home to find his son recovering. The fame for Jesus’ miracles spread throughout all of Galilee (Luke 4:14). The people of Nazareth demanded He do the miraculous things they’ve heard of all through Galilee in His own hometown (4:23). In His example of prophets not accepted in their hometown, Jesus uses the prophets Elijah and Elisha. During the reign of King Ahab of Israel (Northern), Elijah predicts a drought (1 Kings 17). The dew and rain were necessities for the crops so God withheld them as punishment for serving other gods (Deut. 28:23-24). During this drought, God overlooked the Israelite widows and choose to bless one from among the Gentiles named Zarepath (1 Kings 17:8-24). Elijah was to go there to get the food of her last portions. It was maybe close to her last meal since after they would eat, she speaks of herself and son going to die afterwards (v. 12). However, her encounter with Elijah along with her faith preserved her through the drought and saved the life of her son. Naaman, a military commander of Syria, had leprosy. On one of his raids on Israel, he kidnapped a young Israelite girl (2 Kings 5:1-2). The girl ended up telling him of Elisha. Naaman reported to Israel by letter of the king of Syria and eventually made it to Elisha who gave him instructions to cure his leprosy (2 Kings 5:1-14). So Jesus is speaking of grace shown to a Gentile widow and a commander who kidnapped a little Jewish girl as opposed to that grace being shown to God’s chosen nation. The idea of God calling out these self-righteous people on their spiritual unworthiness and His impartiality of grace made His own people furious to the point of seeking to throw him not simply out of the temple, but off of the cliff! Instead of God’s truth being humbling, they suppressed it in anger and sought to get rid of their Promised Messiah.
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